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20100831

Afrikaner rugbyplayer on murder charge

Roux’s credit card was used at a McDonalds outlet by an unknown person - some 30 – 60 minutes after the Afrikaner rugbyplayer was already in SAPS custody…

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August 31 2010. PRETORIA Magistrate’s Court. Blue Bulls rugby player Bees Roux, who was arrested on suspicion of murder, may have been defending himself from an armed robbery instead – according to testimony during his bail application. He was granted R100,000 bail and ordered to appear in the same court on 15 October.

“Die Beeld” newspaper writes that the arrested Blue Bulls rugby player Bees Roux's credit card was used by an unknown person at a McDonald’s outlet – at least 30 to 60 minutes after he was already officially booked in by the SAPS and placed in custody.

Roux paid R100,000 bail and was released on Friday after the death of Mohale. His legal counsel Rudi Krause told the Pretoria magistrate's court at the bail-application hearing that Roux's credit-card was used at 02:31 at a McDonalds - between 30 to 60 minutes after he was already placed in police custody.

USUAL RACE CARD PLAYED BY DEMONSTRATORS:

Picture: some 40 demonstrators protested outside the court room against Roux’s bail – playing the race-card. The evidence at the bail application showed that Roux may however have been targetted for a robbery instead…

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Investigating officer SAPS sergeant Patrick Mafanel also testified that the 'circumstances surrounding the incident remain unclear'. "We know that Mohale was on duty with two colleagues and pulled over Roux on the corner of Schoeman- and Festival Street, claiming he was drunk,' testified Mafanel.

(Note: It is a legal requirement that before a person can be arrested for drunk-driving, they must be breathalysed at the road-block.)

Mafanel: "Mohale told his colleagues at the roadblock that he would drive Roux's car 'because Roux was drunk'. However we don't know why his colleagues then did not follow him, and why they didn't see the assault either.'

The defence council submitted to the court that there are 'many unanswered questions about the incident.' "Why didn't Mohale's colleagues follow him and arrest Roux for drunk-driving?" "Why did Mohale drive in the opposite direction of the nearest police stations - Brooklyn and Sunnyside? - but drove towards Roux's house instead?

Mafanel also testified that Mohale's two colleagues did not submit any statements after the 'incident' because they didn't actually see what had happened.

Roux also said in a statement read out by his defence council that the 'was not a flight risk, that he has thus far done everything in his power to assist the SAPS with their investigation: and "I have no desire to live like a fugitive…’ His council said Roux would plead not guilty to the charge of 'murder' and submitted that Roux was a tax-paying citizen with a permanent address, and earning R850,000 a year.

Chief-magistrate Desmond Nair, who also commented that the 'circumstances were strange,' granted R100,000 bail, which was paid and Roux was released.

Emotions ran high inside and outside the courtroom, with some 40 demonstrators holding up placards opposing bail, and 50 metro-cops inside and outside the court room. After lunch the SAPS tactical-reaction unit entered the courtroom to maintain the peace and protect the family and friends of the accused man. Roux's parents Phillip and Yvonne and his girlfriend Ms Carien du Toit also attended the proceedings. AFacebook page supporting Roux has been launched by his friends.

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The family have declined to speak to the news media at the moment as the case is sub-judice. Roux's sports-agent James Adams told the media after he was granted bail that the rugby-player wanted to thank his friends, family and legal council for 'helping him through this difficult time'.

The legal rules for cops arresting a drunk-driving suspect:

Die Burger obtained information about the usual procedures for the metropolitican police (in the Western Cape) when arresting someone for 'drunk-driving' is to take them to the nearest police station inside an official police vehicle – but not before it has been confirmed with a blood-alcohol test that the person was actually above the legal limit. Metropolice spokesman Nowellen Petersen said 'no member of the SAPS or the metropolice can take any arrested person inside that person's own vehicle to a police station.' Moreover, that arrested person's blood-alcohol levels have to be tested first on the scene before the arrest. "If there is a passenger in the vehicle with a legal driver's licence and whose blood-alcohol-levels are beneath the legal limit, the passenger would be allowed to drive the vehicle instead. "The person who was arrested can also contact someone else to come and fetch the vehicle. Only if there is no-one else available to remove the vehicle from the road-block, a member of the traffic police or the SAPS can drive the car to the nearest police-station, where it will be booked in, and its keys put in a safe until someone fetches the car.' http://www.beeld.com/Suid-Afrika/Nuus/Wiet-sy-kaart-gehad-20100830

The term "genocide" was coined by legal scholar Raphael Lemkin in 1943, writing:

'Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actionsaiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves.

The objectives of such a plan would be the disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of personal security, liberty, health, dignity and lives of the members of such groups... '